Last week Amazon announced that it will be expanding into email services with the launch of a new cloud based service known as WorkMail. This service is similar to Gmail in that it is hosted in the cloud but unlike Gmail it is aimed mostly at businesses and integrates with most web clients including Microsoft Outlook with Amazon providing the back end support and storage on its servers.

What are the benefits of WorkMail?

WorkMail is an appealing solution for organisations for a number of reasons. It’s low cost at only $4 per inbox, easy to scale up and down and can take much of the time consuming and technical work of managing exchange servers and other in-house systems away from businesses and organisations.

One of the main selling points of WorkMail is its increased security and encryption. Companies using WorkMail will be able to control the way that stored messages are encrypted and even nominate a region within Amazon’s network for them to be stored in. This is likely to appeal to security conscious businesses that may have so far resisted using cloud based email for fear of losing their privacy.

How will WorkMail impact email marketers?

WorkMail is very new and we probably won’t see any immediate changes but as time goes on and increasing numbers of businesses adopt WorkMail for their email platform there could be an impact on email marketing and deliverability, especially for B2B marketers.

The majority of consumers still prefer to use personal email addresses for marketing emails so unless they start using WorkMail at home, its likely they will continue using their current email provider to receive marketing emails, at least for now.

As workmail expands and the uptake among businesses increases, any changes are more likely to impact B2B marketers than B2C marketers as the service will be primarily used by enterprises rather than individuals.

Every email service provider comes with its own set of filters and anti spam provisions which will need to be taken into consideration to avoid impacting deliverability rates. It is probable that WorkMail will implement a filtering system like Gmail’s promotions tab and the more recent Microsoft Clutter filter and this could have an impact on email deliverability and visibility.

With Amazon stepping up to challenge the big email providers it’s likely that they will become a force to be reckoned with in the email marketing arena over time and as their email service evolves we will see changes in the future.